A limited constitutional government calls for a rules-based, freemarket monetary system, not the topsy-turvy fiat dollar that now exists under central banking. This issue of the Cato Journal examines the case for alternatives to central banking and the reforms needed to move toward free-market money.

The more widespread use of body cameras will make it easier for the American public to better understand how police officers do their jobs and under what circumstances they feel that it is necessary to resort to deadly force.

Americans are finally enjoying an improving economy after years of recession and slow growth. The unemployment rate is dropping, the economy is expanding, and public confidence is rising. Surely our economic crisis is behind us. Or is it? In Going for Broke: Deficits, Debt, and the Entitlement Crisis, Cato scholar Michael D. Tanner examines the growing national debt and its dire implications for our future and explains why a looming financial meltdown may be far worse than anyone expects.

The Cato Institute has released its 2014 Annual Report, which documents a dynamic year of growth and productivity. “Libertarianism is not just a framework for utopia,” Cato’s David Boaz writes in his book, The Libertarian Mind. “It is the indispensable framework for the future.” And as the new report demonstrates, the Cato Institute, thanks largely to the generosity of our Sponsors, is leading the charge to apply this framework across the policy spectrum.

The shifting nature of domestic policies and agricultural trade between the United States and the European Union over the last several decades means that while some traditional trade irritants are no longer present, others have been introduced that will likely prove difficult to unravel in the context of trans-Atlantic bilateral negotiations. Whereas bilateral trade irritants previously centered on export subsidies and competition in third markets for commodities like wheat, now the disagreements primarily relate to non-tariff barriers (NTBs), including divergent scientific standards, food safety regulations and other issues that are hindrances to bilateral trade… But the difficulty in negotiating these issues is that, because they ostensibly relate to consumer health and safety, governments cannot easily make “trade-offs,” as they can with tariffs. Observers believe that this is the chief reason that the talks over agriculture promise to be so difficult.

Indeed. As we discuss in our paper, tariffs and other conventional trade barriers have fallen over the years, so the barriers that remain are more regulatory in nature, and more sensitive to negotiate. What we’re essentially left with is the difficult issues. They get to the heart of national sovereignty and, on a practical level, require the participation of regulatory administrators who may have very little or no trade negotiation knowledge or experience. They also have little incentive to concede their power. Whereas trade negotiators are paid to, well, negotiate, regulators are paid to inhibit commerce. They face asymmetric rewards: a huge fuss if something goes wrong, not many kudos if they remove the reins and let commerce thrive. Under those conditions, it should be no surprise that they are risk-averse. So this trade agreement will not be easy to complete. In the meantime, though, there is much the United States can do to limit the ability of regulators to shackle the economy with burdensome—and potentially illegal—requirements that limit choice and expose American businesses to retaliatory sanctions. For example, ensure WTO obligations are taken seriously and adhered to. From our paper:

Prior to implementing a new regulation, federal agencies should be required to evaluate the possibility that less trade-restrictive alternatives could meet regulatory goals as effectively as their preferred proposal. Also, the U.S. government should not dilute or bypass the multilateral rules of the WTO through bilateral or regional negotiations that accept managed protectionism. This paper uses a number of recent examples of protectionist regulations to show that the enemies of regulatory protectionism are transparency and vigilance. Policymakers should be skeptical of regulatory proposals backed by the target domestic industry and of proposals that lack a plausible theory of market failure.

Read the whole thing here. And if you are in D.C. or near a computer next Thursday, watch our event to launch the paper.

Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. —Benjamin Franklin

Chinese telecommunications companies Huawei and ZTE long have been in the crosshairs of U.S. policymakers. Rumors that the telecoms are or could become conduits for Chinese government-sponsored cyber espionage or cyber attacks on so-called critical infrastructure in the United States have been swirling around Washington for a few years. Concerns about Huawei’s alleged ties to the People’s Liberation Army were plausible enough to cause the U.S. Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) to recommend that President Bush block a proposed acquisition by Huawei of 3Com in 2008. Subsequent attempts by Huawei to expand in the United States have also failed for similar reasons, and because of Huawei’s ham-fisted, amateurish public relations efforts.

But there is no smoking gun in the report, only innuendo sold as something more definitive. The most damning evidence against Huawei and ZTE is that the companies were evasive or incomplete when it came to providing answers to questions that would have revealed strategic information that the companies understandably might not want to share with U.S. policymakers, who may have the interests of their own favored U.S. telecoms in mind.

Again, what I see revealed here is inexperience and lack of political sophistication on the part of the Chinese telecoms. It was Huawei—seeking to repair its sullied name and overcome the numerous obstacles it continues to face in its efforts to expand its business in the United States—that requested the full investigation of its operations and ties, not anticipating adequately that the inquiries would put them on the spot. What they got from the investigation was an ultimatum: share strategic information about the company and its plans with U.S. policymakers or be deemed a threat to U.S. national security.

Now we have the House report—publicly fortified by a severely unbalanced 60 Minutes segment this past Sunday—to ratchet up the pressure for a more comprehensive solution. We’ve seen this pattern before: zealous lawmakers identifying imminent threats or gathering storms and then convincing the public that there are no alternatives to their excessive solutions. The public should note that fear imperils our freedoms and bestows greater powers on policymakers with their own agendas.

Granted, I’m no expert in cyber espionage or cyber security and one or both of these Chinese companies may be bad actors. But the House report falls well short of convincing me that either possesses or will deploy cyber weapons of mass destruction against critical U.S. infrastructure or that they are any more hazardous than Western companies utilizing the same or similar supply chains that traverse China or any other country for that matter. And the previous CFIUS recommendtions to the president to block Huawei acquisitions are classified.

Vulnerabilities in communications networks are ever-present and susceptible to insidious code, back doors, and malicious spyware regardless of where the components are manufactured. At best, shunning these two companies will provide a false sense of security.

What should raise red flags is that none of the findings in the House report have anything to do with specific cyber threats or cyber security, but merely reinforce what we already know about China: that its economy operates under a system of state-sponsored capitalism and that intellectual property theft is a larger problem there than it is in the United States.

And the report’s recommendations reveal more of a trade protectionist agenda than a critical infrastructure protection agenda. It states that CFIUS “must block acquisitions, takeovers, or mergers involving Huawei and ZTE given the threat to U.S. national security interests.” (Emphasis added.) What threat? It is not documented in the report.

The report recommends that government contractors “exclude ZTE or Huawei equipment in their systems.” U.S. network providers and systems developers are “strongly encouraged to seek other vendors for their projects.” And it recommends that Congress and the executive branch enforcement agencies “investigate the unfair trade practices of the Chinese telecommunications sector, paying particular attention to China’s continued financial support for key companies.” (Emphasis added.) Talk about the pot calling the kettle black!

Though not made explicit in the report, some U.S. telecom carriers allegedly were warned by U.S. policymakers that purchasing routers and other equipment for their networks from Huawei or ZTE would disqualify them from participating in the massive U.S. government procurement market for telecom services. If true, that is not only heavy-handed, but seemingly strong grounds for a Chinese WTO challenge on the grounds of discriminatory treatment.

Before taking protectionist, WTO-illegal actions—such as banning transactions with certain foreign companies or even “recommending” forgoing such transactions—that would likely cause U.S. companies to lose business in China, the onus is on policymakers, the intelligence committees, and those otherwise in the know to demonstrate that there is a real threat from these companies and that they—U.S. policymakers—are not simply trying to advance the fortunes of their own constituent companies through a particularly insidious brand of industrial policy.

The Obama administration filed a formal complaint with the World Trade Organization on Monday alleging that the Chinese government is bestowing various prohibited subsidies upon Chinese automobile and auto parts producers to the tune of $1 billion and that Beijing is, accordingly, in violation of its commitments under the WTO Agreement on Subsidies and Countervailing Measures.

There are reasons to shake one’s head at this move, including the apparent hypocrisy it reveals of an administration that spins the $85 billion of subsidies it heaped upon two U.S. car companies and the United Autoworkers union as its chief economic accomplishment. Of course that figure doesn’t even include the $12-$14 billion in unorthodox tax breaks granted to GM under the bankruptcy terms; $17 billion in funds committed from the TARP to GM’s former financial arm GMAC (which received taxpayer support to facilitate GM auto sales); GM’s portion of the $25 billion Energy Department slush fund to underwrite research and development in green auto technology; and the $7,500 tax credit granted for every new purchase of a Chevy Volt, and more. (Full story here.)

To complain about $1 billion of Chinese subsidies is – shall we say – a bit rich.

Moreover, the filing of the WTO case reveals some of the unseemly perquisites of incumbency. A large concentration of the beneficiaries of the GM bailout resides in Ohio, a state that has had the administration’s strategic attention since its reelection campaign began in November 2008. But in case that largesse wasn’t enough to secure their support in November 2012, a large concentration of the beneficiaries of a successful U.S. WTO complaint also resides in Ohio, which is where – by Jove – the president was speaking when word of the WTO complaint became public.

It is all exasperating, no doubt.

But the bigger and more disconcerting story in all of this is the apparent ascendancy of economic nationalism within the GOP. Romney’s persistence in trying to brand himself the “most protectionist” or “biggest China basher” in the presidential race sort of forced Obama to bring the WTO case – or at least expedited the timetable. Have you seen the Romney ads? Have you read the shrill RNC taunts that cite the widely-discredited, union-funded Economic Policy Institute’s figures on job losses caused by trade with China? Strange bedfellows, indeed!

It was once the case – not too long ago – that Republican candidates argued in support of trade and the freedom of Americans to partake of the opportunities afforded by the global economy. But things, apparently, have changed. The nationalistic strains within the Republican Party have strengthened since 2009. I explained why this was happening in this 2010 Cato paper, which is excerpted below:

Frictions in the U.S.-China relationship are nothing new, but they have intensified in recent months. Tensions that were managed adeptly in the past are multiplying, and the tenor of official dialogue and public discourse has become more strident. Lately, the media have spilled lots of ink over the proposition that China has thrived at U.S. expense for too long, and that China’s growing assertiveness signals an urgent need for aggressive U.S. policy changes. Once-respected demarcations between geopolitical and economic aspects of the relationship have been blurred. In fact, economic frictions are now more likely to be cast in the context of our geopolitical differences, which often serves to overstate the challenges and obscure the solutions.

A sign of the times is a recent commentary by Washington Post columnist Robert J. Samuelson, in which he declares: “China’s worldview threatens America’s geopolitical and economic interests.” That statement would seem to support a course of action very different from the course implied by the same columnist 18 months earlier, when he wrote, “Globalization means interdependence; major nations ignore that at their peril.” That change of heart appears to be contagious.

Understandably, there is angst among the U.S. public, who hear frequently that China will soon surpass the United States in one economic superlative after another. Some worry that China’s rise will impair America’s capacity to fulfill or pursue its traditional geopolitical objectives. And those concerns are magnified by a media that cannot resist tempting the impulses of U.S. nationalism. Woven into stories about China’s frantic pace of development are reminders that the Chinese have not forgotten their two-century slumber—a period of humiliation and exploitation by foreign powers.

A recent National Journal cover story describing areas of bilateral policy contention—which the article laments as “frustrating” the fact that U.S. experts see “few alternatives to continued engagement” —features three menacing photographs of Chinese military formations, one picture of North Korean leader Kim Jong Il flanked by members of the Chinese military, and one photo of the Chinese foreign minister shaking hands with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Subtly, and sometimes not, the media and politicians are brandishing the image of an adversarial China. In Chinese reluctance to oblige U.S. policy wishes, we are told that China selfishly follows a “China-First” policy. In the increasing willingness of Chinese officials to criticize U.S. policies, we are told of a new “triumphalism” in China. In the reportedly shabby treatment of President Obama by his Chinese hosts on his recent trip to Beijing, we are told that the “Chinese have an innate sense of superiority.” But indignation among media and politicians over China’s aversion to saying “How high?” when the U.S. government says “Jump!” is not a persuasive argument for a more provocative posture.

China is a sovereign nation. Its government, like the U.S. government, pursues policies that it believes to be in its own interests (although those policies—with respect to both governments—are not always in the best interests of their people). Realists understand that objectives of the U.S. and Chinese governments will not always be the same, thus U.S. and Chinese policies will not always be congruous. Accentuating and cultivating the areas of agreement, while resolving or minimizing the differences, is the essence of diplomacy and statecraft. These tactics must continue to underpin a U.S. policy of engagement with China.

In this campaign, the RNC seems to be fighting to position itself to the protectionist side of Obama, daring the president to take action – a dare the president has accepted, inflating his political credit in places like Ohio. In response to Governor Romney’s assertion that the president had been soft on China and that he, Romney, would label China a currency manipulator on his first day in office, Obama created the Interagency Trade Enforcement Center, which resonated politically with the target audience. While the challenger blathers about the president’s alleged fecklessness in dealing with China, the president responds by bringing new WTO cases against Beijing. The most recent complaint, relative to the strident tack Mitt Romney is advocating, is the more responsible, more pro-market course of action. If Romney is to be believed, his trade actions would have far worse consequences for the economy.

Instead of focusing on the real sources of economic stagnation in the United States – including the uncertain business climate inspired by the bailouts, the proliferation of costly and superfluous new environmental, health, and financial regulations, a tax code that is in constant flux, frivolous torts, an education monopoly that fails to produce enough talent backstopped by an immigration system that chases it away – Mitt Romney has chosen to blame America’s woes on China. THAT is the message the Republican presidential candidate, with the full backing of the RNC, brings to the voters in Ohio, whose fortunes are increasingly tied to America’s engagement in the global economy. As of July, Ohio’s unemployment rate was 7.2 percent, more than one full percentage point lower than the U.S. rate of 8.3%. Ohio’s economy is growing on account of trade – particularly with China, the state’s third largest market and destination of $2.7 billion worth of Ohio’s output in 2011. Just look at this bar chart that depicts the importance of China to Ohio, and conversely, the costs of a real bilateral trade war.

Governor Romney should ditch his trade warrior schtick pronto, and start explaining to the electorate how pro-trade policies – including the freedom of corporations to invest abroad (to offshore a la Bain Capital)– help enlarge the economic pie. Puffing out the chest to appear the biggest protectionist in the race is bad economics and bad politics.

That sounds obvious, right? I would have thought so. But this Washington Post article on U.S.-China trade issues seems to conflate the two. There’s a lot to criticize in the article, but I want to focus on these two sentences:

WTO challenges are not the only tool the United States has to try to open China’s market. The Commerce Department has imposed dozens of tariffs on Chinese products considered unfairly priced or subsidized.

Now, World Trade Organization complaints are certainly a way to open foreign markets. But imposing tariffs on foreign products through anti-dumping and countervailing duties is not, repeat not, a way to open foreign markets. Rather, it is a way to close our markets. Not the same thing at all.

Traditionally, it has been the U.S. and EU who are the biggest users of anti-dumping and countervailing duties (the most important of the so-called “trade remedies”), which allow domestic industries to take action against what they call “unfair” trade, through the imposition of additional tariffs. In recent years, though, developing countries such as China and India began to catch on to how this kind of protection can be used, and have become active participants in this area. (Brink Lindsey and my new boss Dan Ikenson discussed this in a long ago trade policy analysis.) Thus, we now have the odd situation where China imposes these tariffs against U.S. industries on the basis of alleged subsidies and low pricing. The tables have been turned as China is now, in effect, accusing the U.S. of unfair trade!

An example can be seen in last Friday’s WTO panel report relating to China’s anti-dumping and countervailing duties on certain steel products. The U.S. complained to a WTO dispute settlement panel that China’s tariffs were not applied consistently with WTO rules, and the WTO panel agreed, finding a number of violations.

For those looking for a reason to be optimistic about the future of free trade, perhaps these developments can give us hope. While the spread of anti-dumping and countervailing duties is not good news, the U.S. challenge to these tariffs at the WTO perhaps indicates that the duties have caused significant financial pain and concern to the U.S. producers who were affected. Companies who have traditionally used the trade remedy system to keep out imports, such as the U.S. steel companies affected in this case, are taking notice that these laws can also be used against them. Maybe, just maybe, this could lead to some of trade remedies’ biggest supporters re-thinking the value of the current system, and could pave the way for real reform.

Rum subsidies in U.S. Caribbean islands have sparked an internal trade war and are inviting a World Trade Organization (WTO) challenge from ill-affected countries in the region. According to an envoy representing a number of Caribbean countries that recently came to Washington, the U.S. government is unwittingly funding industrial policy in the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico by tying aid dollars to rum production in a way that is inconsistent with our trade obligations and may cause the destruction of the entire foreign Caribbean rum industry. Under current law, U.S. Caribbean islands receive money from the U.S. treasury based on how much rum they import to the mainland. In recent years, they’ve begun to use that money to increase the amount of rum they produce, so they can get even more money. Although the total amount of money involved is low enough to keep it under Congress’s (myopic) radar, the resulting subsidies are too high for independent Caribbean economies to compete against. Unless Congress places restrictions on how the money can be used, the United States could once again find itself in the embarrassing position of being taken before the WTO for accidentally ruining the economy of a small Caribbean island.

The antagonist in this saga is something known as the “rum cover-over” program. As it does with all distilled spirits, the federal government charges an excise tax of $13.50 per proof gallon of rum sold in the United States. This equates to roughly $2 per bottle. Under the cover-over program, almost all of that money is directly granted to the U.S. Virgin Islands and the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico using a complex formula so that each receives a share of the money based on how much rum it produces relative to the other. The tax is collected from sales of all rum imported to the mainland, even from other countries, and in 2010 the cover-over amounted to approximately $450 million—$100 million to the Virgin Islands and $350 million to Puerto Rico.

The industrial death spiral began when the government of the U.S. Virgin Islands cleverly discovered that, instead of using the money for infrastructure and welfare programs, it could use the bulk of the money to entice Captain Morgan producer Diageo to relocate there from Puerto Rico. Because the move will increase rum production in the U.S. Virgin Islands relative to Puerto Rico, the subsidy more than pays for itself by it helping the territory capture a larger share of cover-over funds.

Puerto Rico initially asked Congress for help. There is currently no rule on how the two entities can spend the cover-over funds, so Puerto Rico’s non-voting delegate to Congress, known as a Resident Commissioner, proposed legislation that would cap at 15 percent the portion of the funds that could be used to subsidize rum production. When that effort failed, the Puerto Rican government reportedly responded by ramping up its own subsidy programs. The result has been an expensive trade war over mainland consumer tax dollars granted in return for rum production. For perspective on how important this is for the players involved, it’s worth noting that the U.S. Virgin Islands government has an annual budget of just under $1 billion dollars and is hoping to increase its cover-over revenue from $100 million to $240 million.

The new twist on this saga comes from the detrimental effect this subsidy war has had on rum production in other parts of the Caribbean. Matched up against firms receiving U.S. subsidies reported to be close to or even to exceed production costs, producers in other Caribbean countries are unable to compete in the U.S. market on price. These economies generally rely on tourism and raw material exports and have precious few value-added industries. If the United States is interested in economic development in the region, the least it could do is refrain from crippling emerging industries with unfair subsidies. While the two U.S. Caribbean governments spend federal tax dollars to entice major rum brands to their islands in order to earn more federal tax dollars, the rest of the Caribbean is struggling just to stay afloat.

It should not be surprising then that the form, size, and effect of these subsidies establish a strong case that the United States is in violation of its trade obligations, and Caribbean representatives have raised the possibility of a challenge at the WTO. WTO rules prohibit subsidies that are targeted to a single industry and cause injury to that industry in the territory of another member. Also, the size and amount of production covered by these subsidies may be so great that they could be considered “contingent in fact on export performance”—a kind of subsidy that is strictly prohibited.

This situation is certainly not just a local issue between two somewhat-foreign governments. The program implicates U.S. trade obligations toward vulnerable Caribbean neighbors, and Congress, being the enabler of the dispute, is already involved. A program that directly pits two U.S. jurisdictions against each other in a fight for hundreds of millions of dollars with no strings attached is unjustifiably irrational, and no one should be surprised that it hasn’t gone well. Capping the amount of the cover-over funds that can be used to support rum production, as originally proposed by Puerto Rico, is an effective and painless way to fix the problem, or at least to keep it from getting worse.

This morning the Obama administration lodged an official complaint with the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Dispute Settlement Body over China’s ongoing restrictions of exports of “Rare Earth” minerals. Rare Earths are crucial ingredients used in the production of flat-screen televisions, smart phones, hybrid automobile batteries, and other high technology products.

The formal complaint was not entirely unexpected since the dispute has been on a low boil for nearly 18 months; the U.S. government recently prevailed in a WTO dispute over a similar issue concerning Chinese export restrictions on nine raw materials used in manufacturing; and, this is an election year in which President Obama has carte blanche to outbid the Republican presidential aspirants’ China-bashing rhetoric with administrative action. So, no surprises really.

Despite the added political incentive to look tough on China this year, the administration should be applauded for its efforts to compel China to oblige its WTO commitments. This is a legitimate complaint following proper channels. In fact, this is exactly the course of action I have long argued for. Negotiations, consultations, and formal WTO dispute resolution (which begin with a long consultation period in which the parties are encouraged to find solutions without formal adjudication) are precisely the methods of dispute settlement conducted by governments that respect the process, their counterparts, and the rule of law in international trade.

Now, my perspective is not motivated by a fetish for WTO litigation, but a certainty that the alternatives would be bad. Unilateral, discretionary actions taken by governments to redress perceived violations or shortcomings of another government undermine the rule of law in trade and encourage retaliation. Both China and the United States are guilty of taking such unilateral, discretionary actions, and bilateral tensions have increased as a result (see here).

U.S. policymakers should appreciate that today’s formal complaint on rare earths is an example of the right way to address perceived trade barriers. They should also recognize in the arguments advanced by the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative the flawed economics in their support of last week’s countervailing duty legislation (the so-called GPX or NME/CVD bill).

Here’s the USTR’s rationale for the Rare Earths complaint:

China imposes several different types of unfair export restraints on the materials at issue in today’s consultations request, including export duties, export quotas, export pricing requirements as well as related export procedures and requirements. Because China is a top global producer for these key inputs, its harmful policies artificially increase prices for the inputs outside of China while lowering prices in China. This price dynamic creates significant advantages for China’s producers when competing against U.S. producers – both in China’s market and in other markets around the world. The improper export restraints also contribute to creating substantial pressure on U.S. and other non-Chinese downstream producers to move their operations, jobs, and technologies to China.

And here’s a quote from USTR Ron Kirk:

America’s workers and manufacturers are being hurt in both established and budding industrial sectors by these policies. China continues to make its export restraints more restrictive, resulting in massive distortions and harmful disruptions in supply chains for these materials throughout the global marketplace.

And here’s Ambassador Kirk in a statement responding (a few months ago) to the WTO Appellate Body ruling that China’s export restrictions on nine raw materials were not in conformity with that country’s WTO commitments:

Today’s decision ensures that core manufacturing industries in this country can get the materials they need to produce and compete on a level playing field.

And, finally, a statement from the USTR’s website on the raw material export restrictions cases:

These raw material inputs are used to make many processed products in a number of primary manufacturing industries, including steel, aluminum and various chemical industries. These products, in turn become essential components in even more numerous downstream products.

Yet the U.S. government imposes its own restrictions on imports of some of the very same raw materials. It maintains antidumping duties on magnesium, silicon metal, and coke (all raw materials subject to Chinese export restrictions). In fact, over 80 percent of the nearly 350 U.S. antidumping and countervailing duty measures in place restrict imports of raw materials and industrial inputs—ingredients required by U.S. producers in their own production processes. But those companies—those producers and workers for whom Ambassador Kirk professes to be going to bat in the WTO case on rare earths (and the previous raw materials case)—don’t have a seat at the table when it comes to deciding whether to impose AD or CVD duties. (Full story here.)

Ambassador Kirk’s logic and the facts about who exactly is victimized by U.S. trade policies provide a compelling case for trade law reform, such as requiring the administering authorities to consider the economic impact of AD/CVD measures on producers in downstream industries—companies like magnesium-cast automobile parts producers, manufacturers of silicones used in solar panels, and even steel producers, who require coke for their blast furnaces.

Last week, when the CVD legislation passed both chambers overwhelmingly, Congress was implicitly thumbing their noses at these same producers and workers who the USTR rightly identifies as victims of Chinese trade restrictions. They are clearly victims of our own policies, derived in dark shadows by interests with asymmetric influence on the process. Maybe we should dwell on that hypocrisy for a while, and work to fix it by reconsidering the self-flagellation that is the U.S. trade remedies regime.